IV. I learned to read in the vicinity of Hums. My father brought for my instruction a Khoteeb or Moslem teacher, who taught me reading. His name was Sheikh Abdullah. The Sheikh Mohammed taught me writing.
V. The Bedawin esteem a boy better than a girl, because the boy may rise to honor, but the girl has nothing to expect from her husband, and his parents and relatives, but cursing and abuse.
VI. A man may marry four wives. If one of them ceases bearing children, and she be of his family, he makes a covenant of fraternity with her, and he supports her in his own camp, but she is regarded simply as a sister. If she be of another family, he sends her home, and pays her what her friends demand.
VII. The girls and women have no more religion than the boys and men. They never pray nor fast, nor make the pilgrimage to Mecca. But the old women repeat certain prayers, and visit the ziyaras, mazars, and welys, and other holy places.
VIII. If teachers would come among us, who can live as we do, and dwell in our camps, and travel with us to the desert, they could teach the great part of our children to read, especially if they understood the art of medicine.
Ali spent several weeks among them, sleeping in the camp, and attending upon their sick. The camp was on the mountains east of the Sea of Galilee. Fevers prevailed through the entire district from Tiberias to Damascus, and Ali devoted himself faithfully to the care of the sick. The Sheikh himself was ill with fever and ague, as were several members of his family. One day Ali prepared an effervescing draught for him, and when the acid and the alkali united, and the mixture effervesced, the Bedawin seated in the great tent screamed and ran from the tent as if the Ruellas were down upon them! What, said they, is this? He pours water into water, and out come fire and smoke! The Sheikh himself was afraid to drink it, so Ali took it himself, and finally, after explaining the principle of the chemical process, he induced both the Sheikh and the Sit Harba to drink the draught. On leaving the encampment, the Sheikh gave Ali a guard, and three Turkish pounds (about $14,) to pay for his medicines and medical services, saying, that as his Bedawin were growing poor since they were forbidden to make raids on other tribes, they could not pay for his services, and he would pay for all. He offered to give him a goat skin bottle of semin (Arab butter) and several sheep, but Ali was unable to carry either, and declined the offer. Ali brought a specimen of Bedawin bread. It is black, coarse, and mixed with ashes and sand. The Bedawin pound their wheat, and knead the coarse gritty flour without sifting, and bake it on the heated earthen ovens.
The Bedawin swarm with vermin. Their garments, their persons, their tents and their mats are literally alive with the third plague of Egypt, lice! Ali soon found himself completely overrun with them, and was almost driven wild. The Sitt Harba urged him to try the Bedawin remedy for cleansing his head. On inquiring what it was, he declared he would rather have the disease than the remedy! After his return to his village in Lebanon, he spent several days in ablutions and purifications before venturing to bring me his report. The Sitt Harba gave him a collection of the nursery rhymes which she and the Bedawin women sing to their little brown babies, and some of them will be found in the "Children's Chapter" of this volume. The Sheikh Mohammed, who can neither read nor write, repeated to Ali the following Kosîdeh or Song, which he composed in Arabic poetry, after his victory over Feisal, of the Ruella tribe, in 1866. The Ruellas had previously driven Mohammed's tribe from one of the finest pasture regions in Howian, and Ed Dukhy regained it after a desperate struggle.
Oh fair and beautiful plain, oh rich green Bedawin pasture.
We had left you, too often stained, with the blood of violent battle;
Ah, dark disastrous day, when brother abandoned his brother,
Though riding the fleetest of mares, and safe from pursuit of the foeman,
He never once turned to inquire, though we tasted the cup of destruction.
Oh fair and beautiful plain, we yesterday fought and regained thee!
I praise and honor His name, who only the victory giveth!
O, Feisal, we've meted to you your deserts in royal measure;
With our spears so burning and sharp, we cut off the necks of your Arabs,
O, Shepherd of Obaid, you fled deserting your pastures,
Biting your finger in pain and regret for your sad disasters—
Savage hyena, come forth, from your lair in the land of Jedaileh,
Howl to your fellow-beasts, in the distant land of Butîna;
Come and eat your fill of the dead in the Plain of Fada,
O, fair and beautiful plain, you belong to the tribe of the victor;
But Feisal is racked with pain, when he hears the battle story,
Our right-handed spearmen have palsied his arm is its strength and power;
A blow fell hard on his breast, from the hand of our Anazy warriors;
Come now, ye who wish for peace, we are ready in honor to meet you!
Our wrongs are all avenged, and our arms are weary of battle.
The Arabic original of these lines breathes the true spirit of poetry, and shows that the old poetic fire still burns in the desert. Feisal now lives in the region adjacent to Mohammed Dûkhy, and they leave a space of several miles between their camps to prevent trespass, and the danger of re-opening the old blood-feud.
I would commend the Arabs of the Desert to the prayerful remembrance of the Women of America. How the gospel is to reach them, is one of the great problems of our day. Their women are sunken to the lowest depths of physical and moral degradation. The extent of their religion is in being able to swear Mohammedan oaths. "Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness; their feet are swift to shed blood; destruction and misery are in their ways, and the way of peace have they not known." Although their hand is against every man, and every man's hand against them, let them feel that there is one class of men who love them and care for them with a disinterested love, and who seek their everlasting welfare!